A Machine Called Earth

After coming to, Hector finally woke with a jolt as he recalled the last thing that happened to him. Which was falling through the floor. However he realized he could not move, for he was tightly strapped to a chair. “Where am I?” He said mumbling to himself, though there was no answer, for Hector was disorientated and the room was dark. There were straps tightly gripping his arms and legs, and Hector tried to wriggle himself free, but to no effect. The room however felt small, though, without light, it was only a feeling. It also had a smell of moist earth. Hector assumed he was in some sort of cave.

After some time, Hector heard footsteps. These were then followed by the rattling of keys. As a door opened Hector was blinded by the light of a lantern. But as his eyes quickly adjusted, he noticed there were two figures that entered. One however was in a wheelchair.

Hector realized he was indeed in a small cave-like room, and in front of him was a table. The lantern was then placed on the table, and the two figures sat on the other side. As Hector squinted through the golden haze of the lantern he jumped when he saw, appearing through the shadows, the man with the bandages on his face. The golden light had revealed the grief-stricken grimace of an otherwise imperious man, and even though Hector did half expect the bandaged man to be the one who entered, he still jumped when witnessing his hideous face. The other man was also who Hector had expected, the man with the gas mask.

The man with the bandages wrapped round his face threw his legs on the table as he made himself comfortable on the chair. He placed his left foot over his mechanical right leg and made a grown as he shuffled in his chair. “Hector, I believe it is, now, I am perplexed, and how did you get here?” He said with a monotone grimier.

“You know who I am?” Said Hector.

The man let out a fraction of a smile, “I know a great many things. But how rude of me, you may call me Moab, and this here,” motioning to the man in the wheelchair, “This is Malachi, oh sorry, my bad, Ichabod* is what he wishes to be called. Now might you please tell me how you came to know of this place?” Moab said as anger grew in his voice.

Hector was afraid and still disorientated, and as he was close to these men, especially Ichabod, the man in the wheelchair, his eyes were drawn to the canister that fed him some sort of gas through a tube connected to his mask. The canister had a label which read, ‘Trees of Life.’

“You didn’t simply lose your way, now did you?!” Moab shouted, becoming increasingly impatient.

“You are correct.” Hector stammered, “I was given directions to this place. I found my way to some underwater city, and the mayor, he told me of this place and how to get here. He had a long wirey beard, and seemed quite crazy, but it seems that he indeed spoke the truth.”

Moab chuckled. “Living under the waves now Shamus? How pathetic, and I wonder what has come of Flynn. I guess those fools couldn’t handle the power.”

Moab then began to cough, which he caught in a blood-stained handkerchief. He turned to Malachi, who was called Ichabod, then back to Hector. “You see, we have become gods. This place we have found, it is limitless, boundless. We have ultimate power, no king, or army can stand against us. And that’s why we can’t have any ragamuffin just waltzing in here, destroying everything we have worked so hard for. If it were up to me, you would be dead, but as it seems, you have peaked the interest of Ichabod.”

“But kings and gods are meant to protect their people. Do you know not the curse that has taken this land captive?” Hector responded. “For in Tammerville, my hometown, people have been turning into beasts.”

“Beasts!?” Moab exclaimed. “Well I see them not as beasts, but if the intolerance of Tammerville is too great, then we offer a haven here above in Violet Town.” Moab tilted his chair back, onto its back legs. “But as we are generous, and, most merciful, we do offer an alternative. The contraption which I believe you have witnessed, the one with the ability to regress the user to their former self. It is free for all to use, though not financially, it is quite expensive, but one must expect a hefty price for such a fancifully remarkable device.”

“You can’t do this!” Hector shouted in anguish, as he fought against the restraints that were holding him down, strapped to the chair. “I have come too far to give up now! You must reverse the curse!”

“Reverse the curse? No no no, this is just the beginning. We are leading this world into a new era, one where the ‘natural order’ of things are dictated by us. And in the meantime, man will pay to hide their sins.”

“What you’re doing here is wrong!” Hector shouted.

“I protest, my dear lad, we are the ones who govern right and wrong.”

“But what about The Keeper?” Exclaimed Hector, though now, speaking of things he knew not. But this comment was enough to rustle the two sitting opposite.

For Malachi turned toward Moab, though only barely, and at that moment the room grew dark, and those whispers were heard again. The strange indecipherable whispers, and now that Hector was closer to the two, he realized something strange. He heard these whispers not with his ears, but within his mind.

Now Hector felt both terror and not, in the presence of these two men. Terror, for they were terrifying to behold, and evil radiated from them. And not, for they both looked weak, frail. Though Moab’s face was covered in bandages, and Hector could not see through them, he figured that if the bandages were removed, there revealed, would be the black, rotting flesh of a corpse. This assumption was due to the rank odor that Hector smelt when they entered the room. And Malachi, well he was the image of malnutrition. Skin and bone. Apart from his skeletal frame was a great deformity on his left shoulder, as large as a man’s torso.

“It seems that Ichabod sees you as some kind of threat,” Moab said, raising from his chair, “or at the very least, a specimen of great interest.” He then preceded to come around the table to where Hector was. “But you have transcended what is acceptable,” Moab now looking down at Hector as he stood in front of him. “And I am afraid, you must be punished. But! You should be proud of yourself, for years we have been in possession of this place, and you are the first to reach us. Bravo I say. But your time for celebration will be short lived.”

Hector watched as Moab drew his finger along the table, and now, for the first time, he was drawn to what was on the table. Sitting on the table were many things. There was a hammer, a knife, and a strange box with a lever and many wires. There were other things, but their purpose was to merely induce fear. A hatchet and flail were some of what else was there.

But it was the knife that Moab went for. He picked it up and began to twirl it around in his hand. He then, without any indication he was about to, thrust it into Hector’s thigh. Instantly Hector let out a great scream for the pain was terrible. Moab then left the knife still standing in Hector’s leg, and picked up the hammer.

Again, without any sign he was about to, nor a single word, he slammed the blacksmith tool on Hector’s right hand. Fracturing the small bones around his knuckles. Again Hector let out another great cry.

Hector began flailing about to get free, but to no effect. He was in a panicked state and began to breathe furiously. But Moab cared not, and Hector’s crying out for mercy did nothing to slow the torture. In fact, Moab actually ramped up the intensity of the torture. He then grabbed a wire which had a clip on the end, which was connected to the strange box. Then grabbing the knife, which was actually more like a large letter opener, or some sort of bayonet, as it had a thin blade, he pushed it down a little deeper into Hector’s thigh, then attached the clip to the iron blade. As Moab approached the strange box, he pulled a lever that was on the top of the box, and blinding volts of electricity arced through the blade, and into Hector’s body. He began to shake violently and his screams ever greater. The room, lighting up in a display only seen in a storm filled sky. Moab switched the machine off, and just before he and Ichabod left the room, he walked up to Hector and whispered in his ear a strange and chilling question:

“Does it burn like fire?”

Hector did not answer. He would not give Moab that luxury, for yes, in the arcing, and the aching, and the flashing and the shaking, it did. But Moab was not to know. But as Moab and Ichabod were leaving, Hector with not the sense to know why he said it, for it was like poking the lion, or throwing hot coals on its head, he said, “Can’t you see that you’re blind? This place is killing you, you’re a walking corpse for crying out loud.” Moab became furious.

If it wasn’t for a command given by Ichabod not to kill Hector, Moab would have killed him for those words. For he had killed friends for less. But he was still going to bring great pain on Hector.

Moab pulled the knife out of Hector’s leg, which actually hurt more coming out than it did going in. “Hmm, it’s still warm.” He said, smiling, his black and rotten teeth gleaming in the lantern’s light. “But as you are here to reverse the curse. I’ll be a pal, and remove that cursed eye of yours.” He then thrust the knife into Hector’s cursed eye and removed it. Blood began to stream down Hector’s face, and complete agony consumed him. Moab then threw the knife and what he had cut out, across the room, and stormed out the room, wheeling Ichabod. As he was closing the door, he said, “You can rot in here yourself!” At that, Hector fell unconscious.

*Ichabod: Means ‘No Glory.’